The KDE Plasma version 6.5 just got released in beta, and it’s bringing some exciting upgrades to the popular open source desktop environment for Linux and BSD operating systems. Dark mode switching, KRunner, and the clipboard manager are among the features seeing improvements.
The most visible update coming with Plasma 6.5 is support for automatic day and night theme switching. When you open your Global Theme settings, you’ll see a toggle for “Switch to Dark Mode at Night.” So long as there are both light and dark versions of your theme, the desktop will switch on its own based on your timing configuration.
In the Wallpapers settings menu, you’ll now also have access to dynamic wallpapers with light and dark alternatives. Complementing the new global theming option, you’ll be able to set these wallpapers to automatically switch based on the time of day.
The feature I’m looking forward to most, though, is saved content in the clipboard manager. When you open KDE’s clipboard manager (aka Klipper), you’ll be able to bookmark items on the clipboard with a star icon, and those “starred” items will persist while other clipboard content gets automatically deleted when you hit the history limit. This update comes with an interface change to the clipboard manager too: you’ll see both a traditional “All History” view, plus an additional tab you can switch to labeled “Starred Only,” which shows only the clipboard content you starred.
This update to the clipboard manager brings feature parity with the Windows clipboard history tool, which has long allowed you to pin content so it persists through restarts and clipboard clearing. If you have starred items in KDE’s clipboard manager and you clear the clipboard, you’ll be asked whether you want to clear the starred items or not. I’m excited for this because KDE’s clipboard manager is one of my most-used features. I have content I’m repeatedly copying, so saving clipboard items is going to save my bacon.
I’m also excited to see that KRunner is getting fuzzy application search with Plasma 6.5. That means now, when you search for an app with KRunner, you can describe it in generic terms instead of needing to remember the name (i.e., Steam shows up if you search for “gaming platform”). Also, making a small typo shouldn’t stop the app you’re probably looking for from popping up. In other words, Steam will appear even if you type something like “staem.” Another win for us less graceful typists.
KRunner is also gaining the ability to search for global shortcuts. This means, for example, you could describe an action you want to take, like “screenshot region,” and KRunner will show you (and let you activate) the shortcut to capture a rectangular region. This one I’d call a win for all of us who forget those advanced Plasma keyboard shortcuts.
There are several more features coming that you can read about in the community wiki, including printer ink level monitoring, improved Sticky Notes, and more drawing tablet configuration options.
To try the Plasma 6.5 beta, you’ll need to get a Linux distro image that comes with “unstable” or “testing” versions of KDE Plasma. Examples are Fedora Rawhide or KDE Neon Testing Edition. You might find an unstable Plasma branch in your distro’s software repositories, but these can be, to varying degrees, out of date.
The rest of us can expect the finalized version of Plasma 6.5 to show up with an update on rolling release and other cutting-edge distros in the next few weeks. I’ll personally be looking forward to it on my EndeavourOS machine.
Source: KDE blog, KDE Community Wiki
